Reality
by Authorwithapen
Summary: What would you do if the man of your affection was brutally murdered in front of your eyes, and you had to deal with feeling responsible for his death? Basically, it's Caitlin's reaction, thoughts, and actions before, during, and after Jay's "death" in Season Two episode 14. Continues a tad bit into the next episode. Contains Cisco/Caitlin friendship in the second part.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** **Hi everyone! This is my first fanfiction ever published, and before anyone gets their underwear in a bundle, yes, I am aware that Season Two of the Flash is long past. However, I was looking through my Notes app on my phone to see which of the multiple oneshots I have written to publish, and this one just seemed to scream "Pick me! Pick me!" So I did. It takes place at the very end of season two episode 14 and continues on into episode 15 (Escape From Earth-Two and King Shark, respectively). Please enjoy!**

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 **Reality**

 _Part One_

Caitlin Snow couldn't have been more excited then she was right now.

The Flash–or Barry, she should say–had burst through the speed cannon with Cisco and an unfamiliar, brown haired girl (who honestly could use a shower, Caitlin thought) not a second ago, and Jay was already reaching behind her to grab the explosive that would close the breach for good.

Caitlin couldn't help but smile.

The joy she was feeling soon turned to worry, however, when the biochemist realized that Harry had never been returned to this world. When she realized that Barry had already gone back to Earth 2 and had yet to reappear. When Cisco started yelling, "Get ready to close the breach for good; Zoom's coming!"

No, she wasn't overjoyed anymore. She was frightened.

Frightened for Barry. For what he might be facing on the other side of that ever folding, blue portal in the middle of their basement. Scared for Wells, and for the reason he hadn't shown up. Sympathetic for the young girl who had just been rescued from Zoom and now might lose her father to the very same man she had just escaped from.

And as the seconds that showed no signs of Barry or Harry agonizingly ticked by, she became terrified.

Everyone else knew it was taking to long, too. Caitlin could see the apprehensive posture that Joe had taken, just waiting for something, _anything_ , to happen. The way Cisco had pointedly shared the obvious thought on everyone's mind, shouting "They shouldn't be taking this long!" just to be heard over the roaring that was filling the room. The way that Jay kept twitching his hands in preparation to hurl the detonation device into the breach, and the way that he looked back towards her in quick, sharp glances to either confirm that she was still existing here, on this Earth, or to be absolutely positive that she was out of danger.

That sweet Jay, she briefly thought. Caitlin adored him. She had finally, _finally_ , found the right guy after Ronnie's demise. Which had, unsurprisingly, taken a very long time to get over. Yet, Jay made loving be so... easy again. He made feeling emotions and sharing thoughts carefree and enjoyable again. No one had been able to do that so easily. Well, no one alive that is. Ronnie didn't count as alive anymore.

Suddenly, the portal flashed a brilliant blue, and the Flash-ever the hero- sprinted out holding Harrison Wells by the shoulders. Now, all that was left to do was close it before Zoom came rushing through and left an even greater path of destruction then before. But as Caitlin glanced over at Jay, she thought she glimpsed... hesitation, in his movements. Why hadn't he thrown the bomb in yet? Was he waiting for a signal to verify that everyone was present and accounted for?

If he had been, he soon got it, as Barry yelled, "Close it! Close it, now!"

That was just what Jay did. The whole room watched as he chucked the bomb into the breach, and it started fluctuating faster and more complex then any other had done when they were shut. Wasn't it just supposed to go... poof? Be gone forever within a snap of a finger? Oh well. It was probably different because of its size.

Caitlin wasn't feeling anxious or frightened anymore. Oh no, now she was proud.

Her team had done it. The had overcome the laws of physics, and even logic itself, to find portals, doorways, hallways even, to other worlds where the laws and customs and people were the same, but different. It honestly sounded like one of the science fiction shows that Barry had told her he liked to watch as a kid growing up in Joe's house. Truthfully, her life sounded like a science fiction show at some points.

Overcome with joy and pride, Caitlin stepped off of the platform to touch Barry's shoulder in a comforting manner. She watched as Jay not-to-cautiously walked up to the breach and, after checking it out for a nanosecond or two, turned around to face the group with a huge grin on his face.

"You did it. You made it!" was all that she could manage to say to Barry as he caught his breath and stood staring at Jay and the portal. He gave her a quick, reassuring smirk before turning around to hug his foster father.

Caitlin couldn't stand to be serious anymore. A ginormous grin split her face as she started her way towards Jay, watching as a smile just as big as her's lit up his face and he slowly started stepping off the platform. She nonchalantly shrugged at him, as if they hadn't just defeated their worst nemesis forever, but had casually eaten an entire Big Belly Burger extra-large combo with a huge fry just for the fun of it instead. Believe her, they had done it a few times when being a superhero's support team had gotten rough. She would always remember this moment as the time that they had finally triumphed over evil, and it hadn't taken a race or a final battle to do it. Yes indeed, she would truly remember this for the rest of her life.

But the moments after that would be ingrained in her brain for eternity.

Jay's smiling face turned to anguish and mild surprise, and for a half of a second, Caitlin couldn't figure out what in the world was wrong. Then she saw the vibrating, black, leather-clad hand sticking out of his chest, right where his heart was, and all she could manage to think about in her confused state was, "No! Not him too!"

Her features frozen in a perfect picture of panic and disbelief, all she could do was helplessly stand by as Zoom stopped the vibrating of his appendage, locked it inside Jay's body, and took away the only thing left on this world that was keeping her sane and happy. The breach closed with a _snap_ , and Caitlin Snow was left all alone.

"Nooooo!" She cried out, desperately, somehow hoping that this was a dream. That she would wake up to reality in a few moments and find her phone with Jay's number and call it. That he would answer her pleading tones with his soft gentle ones, and reassure her that everything was going to be alright, no matter what time of the morning it was. That everything was the same as it had been the night before when she had fallen asleep, and that it was just her out of control imagination going wild again from to many late nights in the lab.

But the reality that she wanted never came.

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 **A/N:** **Hope you enjoyed!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** **Here's Part Two! It seemed like the last part's formatting problem was fixed, so yay! Thanks again JediTimelady for helping immensely (You guys should go check her out, she has amazing stories). Please, if you have the time, take a minute to review and tell me what you think because it really helps me grow as an author. Love it, hate it, etc. Just no flames please. This is only my first fanfiction after all.**

 **Anyways, without further ado, I proudly present to you Part Two of Reality!**

 **Reality**

 _Part Two_

Caitlin stared at where the breach had been, frozen to the spot and deathly still.

 _"He's not dead. He's not dead."_ She repeated the mantra in her head, as if it would somehow become a reality if she said it enough. It could have been her deranged mind playing tricks on her, but she could have sworn that she heard a feminine voice chanting the same thing she was thinking.

"Caitlin?" Barry's voice rang out in her ears. He slowly pulled his mask off and took a few tedious steps towards her, as if she was a wounded animal that might bite anyone who dared venture near.

Turning around to face the team, she repeated it again in her head. _"He's not dead. He's not."_

"Caitlin?"

The woman in question found herself hearing Iris this time. Why were they all saying her name? It wasn't like she had said anything out loud. No matter, Caitlin couldn't bring herself to act on such distracting thoughts. All she could see was Jay, his pained face etched in her memory like a picture with no delete button.

Like Ronnie's face had been before she met Jay. Before she loved him.

"This isn't happening... this isn't happening again!" She tried to convince herself of the truth in her thoughts, but all she could hear was desperation and muted tones. She wasn't even sure if she was talking out loud, and quite frankly, she didn't care. If the team heard her, so what? All she could manage to care about was the Jay-shaped cavity in her heart, which had been covering up the Ronnie sized one beneath that. Her dead husband's had never been filled, just put aside for later reminiscing and frequent sorrow.

But now she had two craters of used-to-be-love that she had to cast away? That was more than a human, mortal heart could bare.

She felt herself breaking down and crumbling under the weight of the pain in front of the team, and still, she didn't care. They didn't matter at the moment.

"Hey, hey, I got you. Come on." Cisco's voice was steady, a big difference from the ravaging storm of thoughts in her head. Caitlin allowed herself to latch onto something real, in this case, Cisco's shoulder, and begin the struggle to walk all the way back to the cortex without falling off her shaky knees and curling up in a ball on the firm, inviting floor.

She didn't notice when they got to the cortex, or when Cisco told her to sit on the spare bed they kept in a side room. Her thoughts were just too sporadic to concentrate on one, singular idea, so she sat on the bed without saying a word or looking up. Eventually, she felt a blanket being placed over her shoulders and felt the mattress shift as Cisco sat next to her.

"Hey Caitlin. Umm, you feeling warm enough? Do you, uh, need a hug or something? I mean, if you want your space, I totally get it, but, you know, just wanted to let you know that I'm here. But if you want me to go, then just give the command and I'll..." he stopped muttering as Caitlin slowly leaned on his shoulder and whispered "He's gone."

Cisco was taken aback for a second. Caitlin was letting someone touch her that soon after yet another tragic accident in her life? When this had happened with Ronnie, no one one was allowed to touch Caitlin Snow for a month unless you wanted the cold treatment. "I know, Cait, and I'm so, so, so sorry for you. If I could bring him back, I totally would. I'm really, really, sorry. Oh..." he trailed off as the dam to Caitlin's heart burst and the tears came flooding out. She sobbed silently into his shoulder, not caring what Cisco thought of her in the moment.

After a while of their position, Cisco finally needed to move his leg; it had been squished between Caitlin and the wall for far to long. Caitlin lazily moved her head off of Cisco's shoulder in the way one might move themselves when they first wake up. Every once in a while, a stray tear would run down her raw, red cheeks and softly drop to the drenched shirt below.

"Hey, um listen... I know this may be a bad time to ask, but do you want to go home?" Cisco inquired. "It's probably a lot comfier in your own bed then on me, and you might feel a bit better with a good nights sleep in you."

Her reaction was immediate. Head shooting up, Caitlin fiercely shook it side to side. "No! I can't! It'll just make me think off him more, and then I won't be able to sleep at all, and I have work tomorrow, and I have to fix up Barry, and I if I don't sleep good, I'll just make everything in everyone's lives worse, again!" She started hyperventilating, desperate to get rid of the agony filling her chest every time she tried to breathe.

"Hey, hey, hey, Caitlin stop, ok? I just need you to breathe in and out with me. That's it, in and out. Keep going. In and out. You're doing great. In and out. In and out..."

Following Cisco's steady voice, Caitlin eventually managed to get her lungs to stop burning and her muscles to relax, even though there was still an immense pressure where her heart was from the sorrow.

"See what I mean?" she whispered so quietly, Cisco had to lean in even closer then he already was to hear her. "I'm just a pain and a burden to everyone. I lost STAR Labs best engineer, Ronnie, just because I wanted him to come with me to a celebration of the particle excelerator. Then I lost Firestorm, just because I wanted to have Ronnie as my husband. I lost him both times for my own selfish reasons. Then Jay came, and I wasn't sure if I would be able to handle another love, but he was so kind to me, and he felt just like Ronnie. But if I hadn't pursued him in selfish love, then he wouldn't have been there in front of the breach to get killed! And I can't even make myself not hysterically cry in moments of stress!All of it's my fault!"

Cisco was dumbfounded at what to say. Caitlin had been carrying all that with her the entire time since Ronnie's first supposed death? No wonder she had been so cold and distant.

"Cait..." he started, not sure how to comfort someone to this level. "I'm sure it wasn't your fault. Ronnie made the choice to go down in the Particle Accelerator, and he made the choice to go with Stein as Firestorm into the wormhole. He probably would have done those things even if you hadn't been there, because that's who Ronnie was. He was kind and selfless, and always put others needs before his own."

Hearing a sniffle from his best friend and feeling her adjust a bit in his hold, he decided to continue on. "And Jay, well, Jay was a great guy. Sure we all had our doubts at the beginning, but you were the bravest of us all. Braver than Barry, braver than me, braver than Harry, Iris, Joe, The whole lot of us. Do you know why?"

Caitlin just shook her head.

"You were braver because you had faced so much in such a small amount of time with Ronnie, but nevertheless, you persisted. You kept coming to work, you never let us down, and you were always there for us, even though we weren't sometimes for you. Then Jay came, and you were brave enough to try again, to pick yourself back up off the ground and start over, when half the people in your type of situation would have just stayed at rock bottom. But not our Caitlin. You turned yourself to the here and now instead of reminiscing on the past and moved yourself forward. And that makes you braver than all of us, so never forget it, alright?"

Slowly nodding her head, Caitlin gradually sat herself up with the blanket and Cisco's arm still around her shoulders. "I just... I don't know what to feel right now. It's like there's nothing going on inside me, like time is still going forward even though I want it to stop and there's nothing I can do about it."

It was Cisco's turn to nod. "I know, and it'll probably feel like that for some time. But this time, we'll all make sure that we're here with you. Ok?" Not getting a response, he got off the bed, still holding the scientist up by her shoulders. "I think that you should go to sleep. Get some rest, and we can talk some more when you wake up. Or we can just hug. That's ok too. Hugs are great. Whatever you want."

Caitlin moved her eyes to meet his. "I can't sleep. His face is etched into my memory, and I see him whenever I close my eyes. But I'm so tired."

Oh. That was a problem. "What if I stayed with you?" Cisco proposed. "Then if you wake up, I'll be right here besides you so that you're never alone again."

Thinking about it for a second, the woman in front of him eventually nodded and lied down on the bed. "Promise you'll stay?" She asked in a small voice.

"I promise." With that, he sat in the chair next to her and held her hand until soft breathing echoed throughout the silent room.

 **A/N:** **Tada! What did you guys think? Sorry if the ending sucked. I honestly didn't know how to end it without going even further into the episode. Besides that, review? It'll really help me grow, and it'll only take a minute if you keep it short and sweet. If not, that's completely fine too. I know what little time a busy lifestyle spares you can't always be taken by reviewing. No problem. Anyways, thank you sooo much for reading! See you next time!**


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